shortman

I bought one of these last year but ended up returning it. I liked the idea of it and even hacked it to have Android launcher and App store on it. But in the end it didn't fit my small wrist very well and I was afraid to wear it for fear of catching it on door frames.

dfischer55

My view of the warranty is that is way too short. If this product can only be warrantied for 90 days then I don't think the engineers and product managers at Motorola do not get it. The warranty should be for a year, otherwise they should not bother to be in the business.

I looked at the reviews on Amazon and found a bunch of one star reviews that point out that this watch fails after merely sweating while using it and that the Motorola web site is necessary for interfacing with this watch but it is hopelessly broken for months.

Not good!

[b][MOD: we double checked and the warranty is one year. We've updated the sale to show this.]

sirocyl

I have this, the 16GB model though. I flashed it using a ROM from XDA-Developers, and now have the Play Store and a useful launcher (Zeam) and keyboard (Flit). It works good as an MP3 player, an auxiliary screen of sorts, and I use it for Google Authenticator.

The screen resolution is quite small, but it's daylight-readable at even zero brightness. I recommend using "RootDim" or similar to turn the brightness down to zero when you're outdoors or anywhere there's light.

Pufferfishy

Why are fitness gadgets so outrageously overpriced? This thing should be $60-$90 tops. None of this tech is anywhere near new / cutting edge.

I've had 2 GPS-enabled devices like this and using them was like learning Chinese algebra. Adding an MP3 player that learns you love 160bpm doesn't add to the appeal for me.
And - I can get alerts from my phone 3 feet away right on my wrist?? Genius! How did I ever spend an hour in the gym without it?

One of the devices I had also forced the use of a web portal for data analysis. They call it an awesome feature - I call it a pain in the ass and a company too cheap to write a decent desktop app. And - shocker - they constantly try to sell you crap.

My 8 year old Polar HRM that uses an IR link works better than these things. But then it doesn't tell me I've run the same 2.3 mile route (at 150 ft of elevation change) every time I use it. Guess I'm really missing out.

thurin

I don't like the rain resistant caveat because I'm sure if I tried to return it because of rain damage whatever amt. of rain fell it would exceed the devices warranty ergo there is no warranty unless it falls apart like a cartoon watch.

benmason

Been looking for a good heart rate monitor at an affordable price, but this doesn't look like it is the one. It looks cool, but I only really need it for the monitor portion and for the time anyone have any recommendations?

apowderhound

When these launched in '10/'11 they were horrible. Motorola failed to deliver the wireless H.R. headphones, and had no chest strap option yet. It was a $300 pedometer! The company they contracted to rep the device in the L.A. area gave misinformation and generally were "pretty faces" with no technical knowledge, we often had to correct them! As a result we didn't sell it to our customers. We hated it!

Luckily, Motorola kept the firmware updates coming and slooowly over the next year it got better and better. Unfortunately, by the time they got it right it had failed publicly, Garmin continues to rule and the Motoactv was discontinued. Although its no longer in production, the current firmware version N8 is solid and resolved all major issues (battery life). They also still support the motoactv site which serves as the "cloud" for your nightly sync, and are responsive on the user forums.

So, if you're still reading should you buy this? Wholeheartedly YES! I've had mine for 5 months (replacing Timex race trainer, Polar FT7, Garmin 305 & 610), I wear it all day every day (using the clip accessory on my belt). It tracks my daily movement ala fitbit (pedometer is accurate) but also combines that with my daily workouts giving me a very to robust view of my daily efforts. It syncs nightly to the motoactv site so you have a daily & monthly record or your fitness. Individual workouts are recorded when you start that function, & when paired with an Ant+ H.R. monitor you get a great array of reviewable data also available in graphs and charts... It's a great fitness tool period, and when worn daily delivers more data than anything else on the market currently.

I get three days per charge with 1hr workout (insanity) per day w/ H.R. but no GPS. GPS sampling rates can be toggled out to every 3 seconds to prolong battery on long runs or rides. There are 40 different workout modes (run, bike, aerobic, etc) which tailor the way calories are counted. The only thing I don't use is the mp3 player, it works though, but no idea on what it does to battery life.

Again, bottom line, it was horrible at release, firmware updates fixed it, hands down more features than anything in its price point, as reliable and accurate as Garmin but does more for the $.

Who its for, anyone anything land based (run, walk, skate, ski, cross fit, weight train, anyone who moves at all during the day)

MondoPest

apowderhound wrote:When these launched in '10/'11 they were horrible. Motorola failed to deliver the wireless H.R. headphones, and had no chest strap option yet. It was a $300 pedometer! The company they contracted to rep the device in the L.A. area gave misinformation and generally were "pretty faces" with no technical knowledge, we often had to correct them! As a result we didn't sell it to our customers. We hated it!

Luckily, Motorola kept the firmware updates coming and slooowly over the next year it got better and better. Unfortunately, by the time they got it right it had failed publicly, Garmin continues to rule and the Motoactv was discontinued. Although its no longer in production, the current firmware version N8 is solid and resolved all major issues (battery life). They also still support the motoactv site which serves as the "cloud" for your nightly sync, and are responsive on the user forums.

So, if you're still reading should you buy this? Wholeheartedly YES! I've had mine for 5 months (replacing Timex race trainer, Polar FT7, Garmin 305 & 610), I wear it all day every day (using the clip accessory on my belt). It tracks my daily movement ala fitbit (pedometer is accurate) but also combines that with my daily workouts giving me a very to robust view of my daily efforts. It syncs nightly to the motoactv site so you have a daily & monthly record or your fitness. Individual workouts are recorded when you start that function, & when paired with an Ant+ H.R. monitor you get a great array of reviewable data also available in graphs and charts... It's a great fitness tool period, and when worn daily delivers more data than anything else on the market currently.

I get three days per charge with 1hr workout (insanity) per day w/ H.R. but no GPS. GPS sampling rates can be toggled out to every 3 seconds to prolong battery on long runs or rides. There are 40 different workout modes (run, bike, aerobic, etc) which tailor the way calories are counted. The only thing I don't use is the mp3 player, it works though, but no idea on what it does to battery life.

Again, bottom line, it was horrible at release, firmware updates fixed it, hands down more features than anything in its price point, as reliable and accurate as Garmin but does more for the $.

Who its for, anyone anything land based (run, walk, skate, ski, cross fit, weight train, anyone who moves at all during the day)

Who its not for, swimmers.

Agreed. I came in late to the MOTOACTV game, just before they were discontinued. Much like the HP Touchpad, they discontinued them just when they were getting good. I love my MOTOACTV with the N8 firmware. It is an excellent sports tracker and I love the iTunes integration to import and export playlists.

Lord John Whorfin

Major flaw: the capacitive screen becomes unusable when you try to use it with sweaty fingers. And even with the latest firmware, battery life is mediocre. The biggest problem in my opinion is that it's completely useless as a watch (you have to push the button or shake your wrist to turn the screen on and the backlight on), and it's impossible to read in the sun.
Good price for watch + HRM, but if you're a casual runner you'll be better off with the Nike+ GPS watch.

kat8480

Let me jump in ...
I won one of thees two years ago from the Motorola booth in NYC Marathon Expo.(Shipped to me in February) I wanted to see how accurate after two separate runs I it placed it on one arm and my Garmin 310 XT on the other. I actually moved my lawn to see if the mapping and breadcrumbs would pick up the small distances and turns.
The music was working fine and as I emptied the second bag of clippings I noticed the screen was black on the Motorola. It seems a rock somehow shattered the glass touch screen. My Garmin was fine. I called customer service wrote them a similar note on how the item broke and how it was only the third time wearing it, they can check the data it still came up when plugged into computer.I sent them the watch for service and after several weeks I received the same broken watch back and an email stating they found the cause of the problem of my watch, the glass was broken!!!! well NO F-ING $HIT. I told them on the phone and in the note. I called back and the rep said its $100 for the repair. She also said if I don't wish to have it repaired she will have it mailed back to me. I said I have it already. I begged the to cover it under warentee its only a two months old and I used three times,but they wouldn't have it. I didn't want to get it fixed but had already bought a bike mount and wrist strap so I figured I will give it a shot I had to pay shipping again back to Motorola to have it repaired.
Nice idea but too much going on and the battery life sucks 3 hrs tops.They claim the have a fix to extend it but then no music. Keep your money go buy a Garmin.

nutmeg9

Me and a bunch of my runner friends received Motoactv watches for pacing races and/or to review, and we were unanimous re how much we didn't like it. Cool idea, but this was the buggiest GPS watch I've ever used and the least user friendly while actually running. It would change screens at random if anything brushed the screen (my shirt, my headphone cord, the air, a ghost) and stop tracking my run for no reason. Mileage and pace were not as accurate as my Garmin 305 or 210.

Sweat rendered this thing pretty much useless, so if you want to wear it in summer while moving at more than a walk, forget it. Swiping the screen to change data displays on the run was a huge pain in the butt. I mean, I'm running in the street or through the woods. I don't want to take my eyes off the road or trail to find the right data among a bunch of different screen options.

I wanted to love it since it has so many cool features packed into a decent-looking thing, but it just wouldn't let me love it. For about the same money, get a new Garmin instead.

gcolwell

I have the MotoActv and have a love hate relationship with it. The first one I had would never turn on one day after I had it for a few months. That seems to be a problem that other users had. Luckily, the retail/co-op store that I bought it at has a very liberal return policy. I got my money back and bought it for much cheaper on an online seller we all know. Unfortunately, after having this for over a year I have just started to get horizontal streak of dead spots on the display. Everything else is working fine. I hope it hold out because I really like the convenience and features on this.

I don't have the motorola chest strap. I do know that my garmin monitor with a polar strap works great.

I have the bike mount which I think is one of the best types of mounts out there because you can easily take it on and off several bikes. I always bring it with me to indoor cycle classes.

It is ant+, so it can pick up all ant+ sensors. I have been successful with power sensors, speed sensors and cadence sensors.

Battery life is fine for me.

I have never had an issue with gps running, walking or biking.

Bluetooth is great. I love being able to go on all types of equipment and not worry about getting caught up on wires.

clanecks

I've had 2 GPS-enabled devices like this and using them was like learning Chinese algebra.

Considering that I learned my algebra in China back in elementary school, it's pretty much the same as what's being taught here in the states. So was that statement a tepid endorsement or what? /confused

Cameron

Re: battery life. If you're going to play music, send it to bluetooth headphones, and wear a heart rate monitor, yeah, you're going drain it faster. For marathon day, I'd leave the music off and skip the HRM. Plus you can change the settings to pole the sats every three seconds instead of every second. I don't think it would be a problem for anyone but the slowest runners.

radi0j0hn

badhabit12 wrote:One thing I would like to remind folks about,,,,,, As with all "ELECTRONIC GADGETS" ,, to days "WOW" item is next weeks discount item.

It's the American way! Humorist Jean Shepherd said (40 years ago) that every time he got the urge to buy a new car, he'd imagine it in a few years, parked on a street in NYC, dented, and with stains where dogs had repeatedly visited it.

djkenmasters

I bought one of these over a year ago at full price and have never regretted it. Is it quirky? A little bit. Does it do everything I want it to? ABSOLUTELY! I run with mine nearly every day. Some days I use my bluetooth headphones and chest strap, some days just chest strap. I ran (jogged) a 4:24 marathon last September with the heart rate monitor and GPS turned on, made it the whole way with battery to spare.

I will say that streaming bluetooth audio to wireless headphones kills the battery faster than anything. But who cares? I would say that with ALL features turned on, I can still go out for ~2 hours. If I want longer, I use my iPod for music instead.

I did a 7.5 hour run with GPS and Heart Rate monitor - made it no problem.

A comment on the Web Portal: It's not as user friendly or feature rich as say Garmin's. BUT - it does WORK WELL!

The device syncs fitness data over wifi, so no cables if you don't want. This is a +.

NoOutlet

I only yesterday saw an item sort of like this linked from Penny Arcade: The Pebble.
Instead of being a complete standalone computer, it connects to your smartphone to get GPS information or stuff like who's calling you.

Kurto2021

I absolutely love my motoactv. So much so I bought a second one after i lost the first one. Battery life is pretty good. I ran for an hour and a half with music playing and it loses about 20%. I have the shake to wake turned on so the screen is pretty much on the entire time. If you turn the screen off when running I would think you could get 6 hours easily. If you get this and it doesn't have the rubber plug in the headphone jack call motorola and they will send you one.

expertune wrote:I really really want to buy one of this. It's a great idea. However, I never bought one based on the researches I had done in the past.

The problem is the battery life. I am a slow runner, I can't imagine, after 3 hours of a marathon race, the battery dies..... then what?

prowpilot

Seriously great device. I have one and it will last 2- 2 1/2 hours at max sampling with blue tooth music streaming, and honestly, who's running longer than that regularly. When I bike longer I take my phone and stream the music from that, greatly extending the battery life. I used to run with my phone strapped to my arm, but it was bulky, I forget I even have the motoactv on.
I think most people are convinced the power problems were caused by sweat getting into the headphone jack, so I always use bluetooth headphones and leave the rubber plug that came with it, in.
Haven't had the guts to root it yet, but it can do a ton of things after that.

turtlegir1

In some of the reviews, it talks about getting music from iTunes and iTunes playlists. Is this actually compatible with iTunes (i.e., music bought via iTunes), or just music important to iTunes from elsewhere (e.g., Amazon, Google, or CDs)?

Seriously, as a casual trying-to-get-into-fitness person, is this for me? I would use it biking, indoor workouts, and maybe for walking/jogging outside.

thelopez8

love my motoactv. use it with bike and ant+ heart, cadence, speed, and power meter. when used this way, gps is not required, extending battery life. a new trick i'm experimenting with is usage of a bluetooth transceiver (connected to motoactv via 3.5mm audio) paired with a jabra bluetooth clipper. in effect, this will offload bluetooth and gps from the motoactv; battery life should be really, really good now.

my only concern with the product is that sooner rather than later, support for web interface will disappear. after motorola was bought by google, this device was discontinued and one has to wonder what will become of the old motorola unit that produced these.

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